Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.

Henry David Thoreau

Painted Desert

May 31, 2001OK RV ParkHolbrook, Arizona

We took the car up to finish the drive through The Petrified Forest National Park.The park has its own exit off of I-40.You enter the park going north andultimately the road curves around andgoes straight south crossing under I-40.Look carefully for the N/S road.That’s the one that goes through the park.

We had done the northern part yesterdaybut we drove that short 8 mile sectionagain and began our hikes at mile9 with Peurco Ruin Loop Trail.

The pueblo was occupied during theperiod from 1100 to 1300. The windowlesswalls were 10” thick.

There was an overlook anda guy who didn’t obey the sign.And the person who followed the rulesand took the surveillance photo.

Some peublo petroglyphs

Further on down the road was Newspaper Rock.More than 650 images are on these boulderspecked by the people who farmed the PuertoRiver Valley 650 to 2000 years ago.

These are some amazing images. And thankfully, you could not go up to the rocks so they had not been defaced. There were binocularson the wayside above. Thanks to David’scamera for these pictures from afair distance away.

On we went when we were slowed toa stop by these two

Pronghorn Antelope were once nearly asnumerous as bison. Their numbers fellto as few as 20,000 by 1924 butthey now number nearly 800,000 now.

They obviously knew they had the right of wayand he was giving us that look to let usknow he knew. The kind you givethe driver who isn’t slowing downquite fast enough as you are in the crosswalk.

Check this headgear.

The scenic drive went on with stops atThe Tepees.It looked like the Bonneville Salt Flatsbut it wasn’t. The distinct white layersare sandstone. The cap of the tepees is clay.Dark layers are caused by high carbon content.Darker reds are iron-stained siltstone.Reddish bases are stained by iron oxide,which is also called hematite.

Do you see the Petrified Wood up onthe top of the following photo? And the logs that have rolled down the side?

If not, here it is. Now can you find it in the picture above?

It’s lunch time.

And then, the main attraction.The Blue Mesa Trail

The Blue Mesa Trail is a one mile walk into the heart of the “badlands” of the petrified forest.

The colorful bands are ancient soil horizons.

Red, blue & green contain the same amount of iron and manganese.

Differences in the color depend on the groundwater table at the time the soil was formed.

When the table was high, lack of oxygen gave the iron in the soils a greenish or bluish tint like in Blue Mesa.

The pink and red formed when the water table fluctuated allowing the iron to rust.

Look at the size of these logs.

We are starting out of the canyon.By the way, the trail is paved to protectthe area from erosion and also tomake sure folks know where NOT to walk.See the raven?

Aren’t those stripes amazing??

One last view.

We stopped at several other interestingsites but I can’t include them all here.You’ll just have to go do the drive for yourself. :-)

But I do want to show you Jasper Forest.

The petrified wood strewn in this valley was onceencased in the bluffs around it. As in Blue Mesa, whenerosional forces removed the soft rocks the petrifiedwood tumbled down and accumulated on the valley floor.Once filled with fallen logs, Jasper Forest wasseriously plundered in the late 19th and early 20th century.

Still SO much wood, I can’t imaginewhat it must have looked like before the looting.

In Crystal Forest, thoughtlessvisitors over the years have removedmost the crystals that gave the forest its name.

But they are beautiful just the same.

The Long Logs Trail circles one of the greatest concentrations of in-tact petrified logs in the Park. Trees over 100' long were stripped of their branches by ancient rivers and eventually came together within this vicinity. Ancient log jam.

225 million years ago, Petrified Forest National Park lay within a heavily wooded, tropical floodplain. Large coniferous trees - felled by age, wind, disease or insects - were swept downstream, eventually settling in and around riverbeds that once rushed through the Park.

Period flooding and erosion interspersed with volcanic activity from the south and west carried sediments and ash downstream, settling over fallen trees in the area. In some cases trees were buried quickly and deeply enough to deprive them of oxygen, thus significantly slowing the natural decomposition process. Over time, ground water dissolved silica from volcanic ash into the porous body of fallen, buried trees. This solution formed quartz crystals that filled hollows and cracks in the logs, eventually 'petrifying' them by encasing and replacing the trees' organic material with minerals. The wood's brilliant colors come from impurities in the quartz, such as iron, carbon, and manganese.

Near the end of the park road is theRainbow Forest Museum

a natural history museum with theseformer inhabitants. Or at least two of them.

Which one of the above creatures lived here 200M years ago when this area was not a short grass prairie? A great riversystem flowed through here and thephytosaur swam through its waterways.

Behind the museum is what is known as

You must enter and leave through the museum rear door.The park is trying very hard to protect these logsfrom what continues to be serious looting.When you enter the park you are told that it isa Federal Offense to remove anything from the park.And that petrified wood gathered from outside thepark is for sale at numerous curio shops.When you leave the park you are stopped for”inspection”.They don’t necessarily actually inspect your vehicle butthey reserve the right to do so and always askif you have any petrified wood in your vehicle.

I didn’t find this so much of a Giant Logs trailas a beautiful logs trail.

and more and more and more

And logs were not the only beautiful thingswe saw in the park.

We exited the park, after our inspection, turned left on Arizona Rt 180 andtook it back to Holbrook, Winnona and dinner.

Off to Williams tomorrow for a down day.Wonder what David will get into while I’mreading and writing blogs??